Kobe Bryant reverted to one of his favorite past times the other day, smacking around Smush Parker like his own personal piñata. He said Smush shouldn’t have been in the NBA but the Lakers were cheap and “let him walk on.” Which is how it felt.

But Smush — playing in China the past couple years — is convinced what did him in with the Lakers was not his below average play (PERs of 13.4 and 11.6 in two years) but rather that he wouldn’t kiss Kobe’s… ring. We’ll say ring.

“You can’t knock the man’s legacy, you can’t knock what he’s done in basketball. His work ethic is tremendous. There’s not an ounce of hate in my blood whatsoever. The guy can play basketball — you’ve seen that throughout his career.

“What I don’t like about him is the man that he is. His personality. How he treats people. I don’t like that side of Kobe Bryant….

“The reason I wasn’t a Laker after my second year is because I didn’t bow down to [Kobe]. I didn’t kiss his a–. I wasn’t kissing his feet. Quite frankly, towards the end of the second season, I stopped passing him the ball. I stopped giving him the ball. I started looking him off.”

Smush tells stories, like the team going out for a bonding dinner before a playoff series against Phoenix and Kobe sitting at his own table with his security guards. Which does sound very Kobe. He’s gruff.

Two points here. First, Kobe was aloof and was not a great team leader at that time, something he has admitted he has worked to change. He has said he tried to hang out more with guys on the road. But you know what Smush — so what? It’s the NBA, you don’t have to like the guy, but when he’s clear and away the best player on the team you still have to pass him the ball. Be professional. Kobe only really talks with guys he respects. He’s more likely to have dinner or even a conversation with Steve Nash than Smush Parker. (Of course, Steve Nash is an old-school pro who couldn’t really care less if Kobe doesn’t talk to him.)

Second, Parker wants to know why if he doesn’t belong in the NBA why he was the third leading scorer on those Lakers teams, why he put up stats? Frankly, because those teams sucked and he had the ball so he got to shoot 10 times a game. Look who finished behind Parker in scoring on those teams — Chris Mihm, Brian Cook, Kwame Brown, Laron Profit and so on. Smush got his moment by default. Parker wasn’t efficient and didn’t make good decisions, but he was still the best option Phil Jackson had on that team.

I say to this day that Phil Jackson taking a team that started Smush Parker and Kwame Brown and getting them to the playoffs may have been his most impressive coaching job.

Kobe Bryant finally won his NBA MVP trophy during the 2007-08 season. But frankly he deserved it more the couple years before that.

If you watched the post Shaq-trade Lakers, Kobe carried that team. Bynum was raw and learning, Lamar Odom was inconsistent (some things never change) and Kobe dragged a team that STARTED Kwame Brown and Smush Parker to 45 wins and the playoffs. That team never should have made it that far, Kobe willed it there.

“But like, the game before we traded for Pau, were playing Detroit and I had like 40 points towards the end of the game. This is back when Detroit had Rasheed [Wallace], Chauncey [Billups] and those guys, so we had no business being in the game. So down the stretch of the game, they put in a box and one. So I’m surrounded by these players, Detroit players, and Kwame is under the basket, all by himself. Literally, like all by himself. So I pass him the ball, he bobbled it and it goes out of bounds.

“So we go back to the timeout and I’m [upset], right? He goes, ‘I was wide open.’ ‘Yeah, I know.’ This is how I’m talking to him, like, during the game. I said, ‘You’re going to be open again, Kwame, because Rasheed is just totally ignoring you.’ He said, ‘Well, if I’m open don’t throw it to me.’ I was like, ‘Huh?’ He said, ‘Don’t throw it to me.’ I said, ‘Why not?’ He said, well, ‘I’m nervous. If I catch it and he foul me, I won’t make the free throws.’ I said, ‘Hell no!’

“I go to Phil [Jackson], I say, ‘Hey Phil, take him out of the game.’ He’s like, ‘Nah, let him figure it out.’ So, we lose the game, I go the locker room, I’m steaming. Steaming. I’m furious. Then, finally I get a call, they said, ‘You know what, we got something that’s happening with Pau.’ I was like, ‘Alright. Cool.’…That’s what I had to deal with the whole year.”

That is just vintage Kwame, complete with the hands of stone that fumbled away so many great Kobe dishes. And vintage Jackson (“Nah, let him figure it out”). If the Lakers had not traded for Gasol, Kobe would have forced his way off the team that next summer. That or Kobe would have just gone postal in the locker room one night.

By the way, Kobe said right before all this he knew this was public, he wasn’t trying to say this behind anyone’ back. He knew what he was saying.

“You mean when I was throwing to Smush? I shot w/ three mother **** on me. That’s the difference. Now I only shoot w/ one, maybe two.”

—Kobe Bryant, on whether he missed Derek Fisher when he left the Lakers in 2004 (via the LA Times Mark Medina on twitter. Fisher stepped up and hit the game-sealing jumper in the Lakers win over Portland Sunday night. Two quick adds here. First, one of the rules of thumb with Kobe is you know he is being himself and honest when curse words casually slip into the conversation like this. Second, Kobe may be a little ticked at Smush Parker’s play (read: 2006 playoffs) but he more likely is ticked about Smush calling Kobe selfish during an interview while Smush was playing in Greece. Kobe does not forget personal slights so easily.